Turning Up The Volume Striking Kaiser Steelworkers Take Their Case To Company’S Doorstep

Some 150 steelworker pickets, wearing and carrying signs and toting balloons, greeted Kaiser Aluminum’s managers and staff driving to their offices here Wednesday morning. The pickets, representing 3,000 striking workers at five U.S. plants, demonstrated at Kaiser’s Bay Area complex one day after the company had quickly rejected a union contract proposal and walked away from negotiations in Minneapolis.

The pickets strolled along Sunol Boulevard in front of Kaiser’s 50-acre, park-like site across from a tiny housing development. They waved at the Mercedeses and minivans that drove by.

Then David Foster, the steelworkers’ chief negotiator, arrived to discuss the latest contract meeting.

Ten company representatives attended the contract discussion Tuesday, he told the steelworkers, adding that none seemed able to make decisions on behalf of the company. He said the union proposal offered the company a way to improve productivity while ensuring that all hourly workers keep their jobs. He said the proposal also offered a voluntary early retirement program.

Kaiser officials said the offer was disappointing, citing the cost of the proposal and saying it did not meaningfully address productivity issues. Top company officials have said continuing production during the strike has shown them the hourly work force could be cut by 600 to 900 workers systemwide.

Foster said company negotiators have put off talks when the union has asked for bargaining sessions.

“It would be laughable if there weren’t so many families at stake,” Foster said. The two sides haven’t agreed to full negotiations since the strike began Sept. 30.

In Spokane, the strike has idled 2,100 workers at Mead and Trentwood.

Kaiser denies delaying a return to bargaining.

“The company has bargained in good faith all along,” said Kaiser spokeswoman Susan Ashe. “We still intend to reach agreement with steelworkers. Of course, we’re willing to meet with the union, but we’re not willing to meet about non-productive issues.”

Foster said that the company’s actions prior to the strike and its unwillingness to return to the bargaining table make it appear Kaiser planned the labor dispute to attack the union. But Kaiser’s strikers will keep up the fight, he added. “It will be the kind of fight that will put (Kaiser president) Ray Milchovich on the unemployment line.”

Milchovich could not be reached for comment Wednesday on the picketing or the bargaining talks.

Foster recalled that when his own local went on strike 20 year ago, while he wasn’t earning money, he gained other things.

“These are the kind of times that build families, the kind of times that build unions,” he said. “We’re all going to be better people for getting through this.”

Foster’s announcement to the steelworkers that he thought Kaiser would be ready to talk in a couple of weeks drew a collective moan.

“This strike could be ended in a couple of days if the company’s spokespeople were authorized to do it,” he said later.

But Kaiser says its chief negotiator, David Pryzbylski, has full authority to bargain for the company.

In Pleasanton, Kaiser employs about 260 salaried workers and has a center for technology as well as administrative offices. Two large buildings are tucked into the landscape between Interstate 580 and Sunol Boulevard. At one end, across a rolling manicured lawn, a fountain sprays high into the air.

“Maybe that’s their lagoon system,” joked one picket, who said he was reminded of the wastewater lagoon at Trentwood, where he works in the remelt department. He said his name is Michael Jordan, same as the NBA superstar, who also is on strike. “I’m the broke one though.”